


despite his weakness

by scepticallyopenminded



Series: 30 Day Lyrics Challenge - 2017 [27]
Category: Psych
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Gen, Lies, Revelations, mostly just recapping with some shawn thoughts inserted into it, psychfransisco is so great yall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-28
Updated: 2017-12-28
Packaged: 2019-02-22 21:55:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13175994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scepticallyopenminded/pseuds/scepticallyopenminded
Summary: When Shawn decides to take up the stint as a psychic detective, he doesn’t really think it through.A trait that many people in his life would probably say he possesses in regards to many things. Particularly his dad, and particularly about professions. And it’s not as if it’s untrue; even to this day, even though he’s kept on this particular job for eleven years, he still has trouble thinking some things through (and no, Gus, not the name, he thought through that for days and he still stands by it. “psychphrancisco” is genius.)





	despite his weakness

**Author's Note:**

> I dunno how I feel about this but I've been rewatching all of Psych again (for like the tenth or so time) now that it's on Amazon prime so when I read today's lyric it's all I could think about it. I haven't read it over so I don't know if I've made any major mistakes so lemme know if I did. It's late and I'm tired and I got caught up in Wikipedia black holes again.
> 
> lyric from The Littlest Things by Streetlight Manifesto: 
> 
> "When everybody's spilling lifelong secrets/I'm betting safely I'm the man who will keep his/Despite his weakness/He'll take his secrets to the grave"

When Shawn decides to take up the stint as a psychic detective, he doesn’t really think it through.

A trait that many people in his life would probably say he possesses in regards to many things. Particularly his dad, and particularly about professions. And it’s not as if it’s untrue; even to this day, even though he’s kept on _this particular_ job for eleven years, he still has trouble thinking some things through (and _no_ , Gus, not the name, he thought through that for _days_ and he still stands by it. “psychphrancisco” is _genius_.)

What he didn’t really figure, way back then, was having to _lie_ to so many people in his life. Sure, there’s always his dad and Gus, who’ve known everything from the very beginning. It’s been helpful, having them there to keep him grounded when he gets too into his own head and his secrets. At first, lying to Lassie and the chief and Jules is easy. He has everything to gain and everything to lose and sure, after the first case he might have given it up then and there and called it a day and just continued calling in tips when he noticed something on the news. But he _liked_ this, and he dove headfirst into it.

Of course, as things tend to go in his life, there are consequences. Most of the time, the consequences of his actions are minor, though there was those two weeks in his mid-twenties he was homeless. That hadn’t been too bad though; he’d stayed at a friends house for three nights, and had a string of one-night stands and stayed at their places, and ended up being put up in a nice-ish hotel in Vegas by a rich widow who felt bad for him. _Usually_ , the consequences to his actions are even less bad than that; sometimes he was broke for a day or two while switching from job to job, once lived in a ten-by-ten apartment for a week and a half, often it was just getting yelled at by someone the morning after when he’d forget their name.

But the consequences of _this_ \- of lying to the _police_ \- could be major. He was aware of that when he decided to get himself deeply into it. The chief said it outright when he was hired the first time: “hindering a police investigation is a criminal offense”. He doesn’t think that they would have _wanted_ to prosecute him after the first twenty or so cases he solved, but he also knows that they’d have had to throw out all the cases he worked on and that - _that_ \- is what irks him now, looking back. Even as he continues to do so for the SFPD. Knowing that with the _smallest_ slip up, his cases could have the potential of being thrown out.

What he’s _never_ counted on is that lying got harder over time. Particularly to those he got closest to: Lassie, Jules, Chief Vick.

But some secrets were worth keeping. And this secret always has been. He gets to do something he honestly enjoys doing, is good at doing, and he’s helping people! Really helping people, getting murders and thieves and nuisance-doers off the streets and keeping the others safe, plus doing some little side things to make people’s lives a _little_ easier (no matter that nobody thinks he should be helping people figure out if their significant others are cheating on them, not when they’re so well established doing “real” cases - _he_ thinks that those _are_ real cases and they matter just as much and they’re easy, some quick money).

Shawn thinks, for years and years, that nobody but him, Gus, and his dad will really know the truth about his powers. He’ll take this secret to the grave because it’s worth keeping. If he gets to do _this_ for the rest of his life, he’ll happily do what he has to to keep his psychic ability (lack thereof) a secret.

When Juliet finds out Shawn feels a mixture of pure relief and absolute heartbreak. Heartbreak, because he can’t believe he allowed himself to hurt her like this. The look on her face when she asks him about it - if any of it was real - he feels it in his soul. He feels himself crumbling in that moment, his entire confident facade he keeps up ninety-nine percent of the time vanishing in real time and all he can think about is that they met in the restaurant and he worked his psychic shit on her for the first time.

And it’s all he can think about, the day that he first got himself in too deep with _her_. He didn’t know that day that she would become his everything, but his actions have real fucking consequences. He’s worried that she’ll never forgive him, that she’ll always assume that he was lying about everything to cover his ass, that she’ll tell Lassie, the chief, the entire department.

The latter less so, though it’s a real worry. He just cannot imagine the rest of his life without her because of some _little_ lie that he told so many years ago that’s followed him. And yes, it seems like a little lie compared to all the things he's been truthful about; he's not psychic, but he's still solved all those cases. It's just the psychic thing he's lied about. 

She doesn’t tell anyone, and eventually, after many months and lots of trust building, she does forgive him, and he breathes easier again.

It’s then he really thinks about, realizes exactly what it would mean for him and for so many people if his secret came out, and he decides: this is something he’ll die with as few people as he can manage knowing. Him, his dad, Jules, Gus. It’s more than perhaps is suitable, but he trusts all of them. They all know the damage it would cause, and more than that, they all have his back. And he realizes that his actions _do_ have consequences, even if they aren't ones he’ll see for years down the road.

Until he decides to leave Santa Barbara. He loves it here, he really does. Almost all of his memories are of this place, this little town by the sea. He grew up here, he met his best friend here, he met his girlfriend here, he started the rest of his life here. He doesn’t know if he plans on continuing the psychic detective thing in San Francisco, but he knows he has to follow his heart and he has to go. He doesn’t think he’ll be able to do it all without Gus.

It doesn’t matter, in the end. But he does leave the video for Lassie and he almost doesn’t. He knows that Lassie, out of everyone, has been the one person in his entire time who has steadfastly refused to believe that he’s actually psychic, and he doesn’t know if he wants to ruin that. But he knows without a fraction of a doubt that Lassie, out of everyone, deserves to know for certain. He leaves the video, chest feeling lighter.

There are still, even now after three years in San Francisco, people that don’t know. Chief Vick still believes in him, even if she’s still as immune to and disapproving of his antics as she’s ever been. The general populace believes in him, the majority of the police force won’t ever know, both in SB and SF.

He’ll take some secrets to the grave, that’s for sure. Most of the world who know him think he’s psychic, and it’ll stay that way because there’s no reason to ruin a good thing. But he feels lighter, knowing that at least he can share the truth with some of the closest people to him in his life.

**Author's Note:**

> find me at [asocialfoxpaw](http://asocialfoxpaw.tumblr.com)
> 
> don't post my stuff on goodreads or like sites thanks!


End file.
